Greens to four in Port Phillip poll

THE Greens have announced four candidates to run in the local government elections next month.

Councillor John Middleton will renominate for the Junction ward. He said the council needed to take action on climate change, encourage sustainable transport and develop a  strategic plan for the Junction and St Kilda Road south.

The former engineer listed the St Kilda Family and Children’s Centre, the Marina Reserve skate park, the Emerald Hill Library and South Melbourne Market’s new roof as key achievements made in the present council’s term.

Balaclava resident and Barkeep owner Tim Baxter said his experience in the hospitality industry gave him an insight into the local economy.

The Carlisle Ward candidate will campaign on sustainable business practices and said he would support initiatives that maximise energy efficiency.

Point Ormond ward candidate Meni Christofakis said she was concerned that not enough was been done to prevent flooding in Elwood.

Ms Christofakis will also campaign on quality education, child care and services for the elderly.

Lawyer Ann Birrell will run in Albert Park ward, campaigning on environmental conservation and planning issues.

Ms Birrell said protecting open space and public land from over-development was also important.

Posted in Story | Comments Off on Greens to four in Port Phillip poll

My Voice: Sandra Sanders

Sandra Sanders has a crafty way to inspire and be environmental.

AT the age of 14, I experienced something no child should ever have to: the death of my mother. As she was a single parent and I an only child, her death left me orphaned and the responsibility for my welfare was handed over to myriad foster carers who were often abusive.

By the age of 22 I had developed numerous mental health issues and was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, chronic depression and generalised anxiety.

After a year of treatment, I felt strong enough to leave my house for short periods of time. The very first event I headed to was a craft show. It was there that my life began to transform. At the beginning of the weekend I didn’t know how to sew; by the end, I’d started my own small business selling handcrafted goods.

My journey with craft mirrored my journey of healing. As I completed each craft project, the sense of achievement it provided me lifted me further out of depression. Within a few weeks I was confident enough to launch a blog, hold my first market stall, and open an online shop.

At the end of last year, another significant shift occurred: I suddenly realised that I no longer experienced mental health issues. It was at this point that I committed to bringing the healing powers of craft to the community around me, and my crafting group Craft Like Crazy was born.

Sustainable ethics are at the heart of Craft Like Crazy. I’m really passionate about inspiring people to create amazing, beautiful things for themselves, their homes and their loved ones without adversely affecting the environment, animals or people. All of the materials we use are therefore 100 per cent natural, chemical-free, eco-friendly, vegan and not tested on animals. I also do my very best to use locally-sourced, organic, and fair-trade ingredients. I love the fact that I’m teaching age-old skills, such as how to create soaps, candles and beauty products, and that the workshops I run are reducing people’s dependence on purchasing environmentally-damaging, chemically-laden products that are made in factories halfway around the world.

Attendees pay for the cost of their materials.Our products will soon be available at St Kilda’s Esplanade Market. Craft Like Crazy is more than just a school for craft; it is a space for healing, friendship, community, and personal growth.

Posted in Story | Comments Off on My Voice: Sandra Sanders

Tripping: Green get-aways can be a blast

ECOTOURISM is probably the most misused term in the travel industry’s lexicon. What one travel site calls ‘‘eco’’ another calls ‘‘sustainable’’. And while many of us pay attention to those little signs in hotel bathrooms asking us to reuse the towels to save water, are we being led up the rainforest path if we think we’re reducing our carbon footprint just by going for a nature walk?

There is a difference between ecotourism and sustainable travel,’’ says Bradley Cocks, senior vice-president of business development for Kiwi Collection, a luxury hotel and resort travel booking website.

‘‘Ecotourism is visiting isolated or remote areas usually located in pristine environments. It has a high emphasis on conservation. Sustainable tourism is reducing your footprint while travelling to local cultures and eco-systems so the development of tourism has a lasting positive effect.’’

We can do this, Cocks says, by adopting simple measures such as buying products that will last the holiday and be taken home, leaving no waste; contributing to local conservation initiatives such as tree planting; or donating money to offset carbon emissions from your flight.

But does taking a sustainable or eco-holiday mean having to rough it in the wild? Not according to Cocks. ‘‘More and more luxury resorts across the globe are making the move to become lean and green,’’ he says, adding that one of the best examples of sustainable tourism is Nihiwatu Resort in Indonesia, which set up the successful Sumba Foundation (sumbafoundation.org) to tackle poverty on the island of Sumba.

‘‘The hotel produces 100 per cent of its energy needs from biodiesel made from coconuts; they recycle absolutely everything and even have a carbon-offset program, to date planting more than 64,000 trees,’’ says Cocks.

And, of course, we shouldn’t be surprised to learn that Richard Branson is creating what he calls “the most environmentally friendly resort on the globe”.

The Mosquito Island development, in the British Virgin Islands, will feature 20 villas and a beachfront restaurant powered entirely by wind turbines and solar panels. All motorised transport will be powered by biofuels. The guests’ food will come from a local organic orchard.

Chiva-Som health resort in Thailand reduces plastic waste by giving guests refillable metal water bottles, among other measures designed to conserve resources.

But hotels can’t just declare themselves sustainable. There are rigid auditing schemes such as Green Globe, a travel and tourism industries’ certification program (greenglobe.com).

One of the newest trends in green travel is ‘‘voluntourism’’, where visitors give something back to locals on their travels.

Sri Lanka holds the Lanka Challenge (lankachallenge.com) where teams compete in a tuk tuk race around the country, raising funds for local charities (via donations from home) and spend their days planting trees, digging wells or participating in other local initiatives.

And in Costa Rica, visitors can teach English, build wildlife shelters or put their dental or medical qualifications to use while visiting one of the most beautiful and biodiverse places on earth.

So next time you’re on holiday, think about the impression you’d like to leave behind – starting with reusing your towels.

Posted in Story | Comments Off on Tripping: Green get-aways can be a blast

Tina Arena on fame, fights and family

From young talent to sophisticated chanteuse and mentor – has life come full circle for Tina Arena?

WHILE moving house recently, I stumbled across a bag of bits and bobs I’ve been lugging around since childhood. Prepared for a ruthless cull, there were a few things I simply couldn’t part with, one of which was my dog-eared Young Talent Time fan magazine. I’d saved my pocket money for months when I bought it in 1984. Pouring over the pages I’d skip the opening feature on host Johnny Young and rush straight to the story on my all-time favourite, Tina Arena.

I could practically recite the article about the “retired” 17-year-old team member and how she was desperate for a recording contract. “I have to have that hit record behind me,” she was quoted as saying. “With it would come a film clip that would be played on television and I would be an established performer. So I must wait until the record is right.”

Skip forward to 2012 and Arena has not only achieved her ambition to become an “established performer”, she’s surpassed it. At 44, she has recorded more than a dozen live and studio albums, sold more than eight million records around the world, and scored six ARIA awards at home. It seems fitting, then, that her most recent gig has her back where it all began – on the set of Young Talent Time.

There’s been plenty of musing about Arena’s life coming full circle, given her latest role as onscreen mentor in the 2012 incarnation of the program that made her a household name. But after meeting the straight-talking superstar, it’s clear not everything in Arena’s world has revolved 360 degrees. And that’s not a bad thing.

She says she agreed to be involved in this latest version of YTT (there have been several failed attempts) because she believed the timing was right. “It was time to bring some honest, innocent, wholesome family entertainment back on the screens,” she says. “A lot of the violence on TV has been a grand waste of time. It has polluted a generation of children and we need to be more responsible.”

She says YTT sits in its own little bracket. “I’m so happy to be a part of it, because it’s not violent and makes people smile and feel a great sense of warmth when they watch it. There’s a sense of familiarity and I think that’s really beautiful.”

Arena’s strongest memories of her time on the original series (between 1974 and 1983) are of being surrounded by an abundance of “love and wisdom”.

“I was very young, a baby – YTT was my second family,” says the one-time prodigy who burst on to our screens at the age of seven under her real name, Filippina ‘‘Pina’’ Arena, which was soon changed (at Johnny Young’s suggestion) to Tina – aka Tiny Tina.

Life after Young Talent Time has been littered with highs and lows. Initially she struggled to shrug off the YTT stigma and establish herself as a serious performer. Perseverance paid off, however, and she went on to release several albums in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s, which sold millions of copies both in Australia and overseas and spawned such pop hits as I Need Your Body and Chains. Her album Don’t Ask was the top-selling Australian record in 1995.

By the late ’90s, life in Australia had started to sour. There was a bitter divorce from her husband and then-manager, Ralph Carr, and an acrimonious split with her record company, Sony (she says she was politely asked to leave). She decided on a fresh start, heading for London and Paris to explore new musical styles and opportunities.

It proved to be a turning point. After her duet with Marc Anthony, I Want to Spend My Lifetime Loving You (the theme song to the film The Mask of Zorro) went gold in France, she embraced the country, becoming fluent in French and releasing three French-language albums. The locals couldn’t get enough and the records sold millions.

Arena’s personal French love affair was cemented 10 years ago when she met French performing artist Vincent Mancini. The couple has a six-year-old son, Gabriel, who has accompanied Arena back to Australia for her six-month stint on YTT.

While Arena commutes to Sydney each week to record the program, she’s based in Melbourne near her parents’ Moonee Ponds home, where Gabriel attends a local school. Arena says he fitted in immediately. “He’s like a duck to water, he never ceases to amaze me, that little boy. He’s quite inspiring,” she says.

“He loves the lifestyle, the generosity of spirit. Australia equals fun for him. It’s his mum’s country and he loves his [Aussie Rules] football.”

Arena’s return to Australia will also take in her upcoming tour. “Performing is my favourite part of my travelling show,” she says. “I love to get up and sing first and foremost – unfortunately the other stuff sometimes plays too much of a role in what it is we have to do. We’ve had to become media experts in the process, lord knows why.”

The pop siren will sing in front of a 54-piece orchestra, headlining the opening of Hamer Hall in July after its extensive renovations. She will perform a repertoire of her hits and classical pieces. “The song choice is always great storytelling and for me, that’s the ultimate thing. People walk into the show and usually walk the emotional gamut.”

After the tour, Arena will resettle in France, where she and Mancini are renovating their 1930s house outside Paris. Next on her to-do list is a new album full of songs that embrace the storytelling she adores. It’s been nearly eight years in the making, as Arena has worked on interim projects such as French and English greatest hits albums and two collections of covers of her of long-held favourite songs.

“I think people stopped listening to stories [through songs]. They were too stressed with day-to-day living, being slapped with consumerism and keeping up with life, which has become very difficult,” she says. “Australia has become very different to the country I grew up in, which was much more laid back.”

That said, she believes attitudes are finally shifting. “Universally, we have pushed the envelope as far as we can. What do we do now, where do we go? We have to go back and revert.”

Going back to basics is an approach she takes seriously, literally from the ground up. “My son is with my father picking tomatoes and figs and planting herbs. I begged my father to pass on that knowledge to him … his generation need to understand.”

From eating her dad’s vegies to appearing weekly on Young Talent Time, some aspects of life may have come full circle for Arena. But compared with the young woman plagued by insecurities as she tried to find her feet in the music industry, the grown-up chanteuse says she has rid herself of past baggage.

She says she appreciates how lucky she has always been, even through the tough times. “I got a couple of chunks taken out of me, but they grew back. What doesn’t kill you does make you stronger. ”

Arena insists it was the tough times that have made her the success she is today. “It was like life saying, ‘You’re a very privileged, young lady. Don’t abuse what it is that you have. Be very aware that it’s unique and it’s not anything that you should ever take for granted’.”

Wise words that perhaps would have helped the 17-year-old Arena, now safely tucked away in that dog-eared fan magazine, that has secured a permanent place on my bookshelf.

Tina Arena will perform on July 28 and 29, and August 5 at Hamer Hall. Details, visit artscentremelbourne.com.au or call 1300 182 183. Young Talent Time screens on Channel 10 on Sundays at 6.30pm

Posted in Story | Comments Off on Tina Arena on fame, fights and family

My Voice: Julie McBeth

Port Melbourne astrologer Julie McBeth has combined her two loves – the financial world and astrology – to create an unusual career path.

Most people are fascinated when they find out I’m an astrologer. I started off my career as a business journalist with Business Review Weekly and the Australian Financial Review after graduating with a commerce degree. During my cadetship, one of my fellow journalists gave me my first astrology reading and I couldn’t believe how accurate it was. I soon blended my interests and began studying financial astrology. Twenty years down the track, I am still fascinated by how the movements of the planets can help you understand the natural cycles we live in every day. I can then use this to predict the future and help others gain a better understanding of their lives.

I use astrology to help people. When people are going through a difficult time, you can see the end of that time for them in the ending of the cycles and I can see when things are likely to change. I like being able to guide them and let them know when a shift will be likely to happen for them. For example, I was at an astrology conference in January 2008 and we saw Pluto move into Capricorn. We knew from the stars to expect that something was going to happen to the financial market and that there would be a breakdown in structure – and that’s when the market crashed. Later in the year, we also saw the US banking system collapse.

In 2008, I decided to take my love of astrology to television. I produced my first television series for Channel 31, Cosmic Imprint. I also made regular guest appearances on David & Kim and The Circle. Now, I’ve been cast as lead presenter of new Channel 31 program Stars and the City. We chat about all things magical and mystical and have some amazing guests, like Dave O’Neil and Des Dowling, who receive astrology readings.

I’ve lived in Port Melbourne for more than 10 years. It’s great to live by the water as it helps you relax after a long day working hard. I moved there to be close to the beach. It’s also close to the city, and has lovely cafes and shops. My place looks out to the pier and I see the Spirit of Tasmania coming in every day – I love the calm.

When I first moved here, I was a financial public relations manager for the National Australia Bank. But after a while, I realised I had to decide what I really wanted to do with my life – so I decided to combine my journalism, public relations and astrology skills to create fun and interesting television.

Posted in Story | Comments Off on My Voice: Julie McBeth

Comedian Tommy Little tackles being young, stuffing up and getting nude

HOW far would you go for your career? Perhaps you’d move interstate, take a pay cut for the right gig, or even put up with the world’s worst boss. But would nude bungy jumping ever be part of the deal?

For Port Melbourne comedian Tommy Little, ripping off all his clothes and plummeting off a platform in New Zealand was terrifying and even a tad humiliating, but it gave him plenty of fodder for his stand-up shows.

Luckily, Little says he gained more than wind burn from the experience – he also gained a more daring attitude.

“I felt so uncomfortable, I think the whole of New Zealand felt uncomfortable,” he says.

“I think it’s important for life – you should occasionally be uncomfortable and you should occasionally be awkward, so you can go through the spectrum of life, otherwise you’ll just have mediocrity.

“So what I’m trying to say is get nude and find something to jump off.”

Little has worked his way up from obscurity, with his first year packed with 106 unpaid shows, to hosting Channel 31’s talk show Studio A, to making appearances on The Today Show, Mornings with Kerri-Anne, The 7pm Project and radio station Nova FM.

This year, the 27-year-old is returning to the Melbourne International Comedy Festival with his new show, A Fistful of Apologies, which he describes as a show about “being young and stuffing up in life”.

“It’s about me, I became an uncle for the first time and I had a think about what I would tell my niece if I had to give her some words of advice. It really cleansed my soul of some of the mistakes I’ve made, some private, some not,” he says.

Little says considering huge success as a comedian is rare, he’s lucky his career choice is “kind of working out”.

“I think I just sucked at everything else, I don’t think it was so much a choice as a last resort,” he says.

“I try not to think about it at all because it’s a really bleak outlook. Only a few people do really well at this and the odds aren’t very good. I have no plan B, so I try to surge on and not think about it.”

So what is it that makes a comedian laugh? Little says he still enjoys simple humour.

“If you give me Australia’s Funniest Home Videos and it involves a pinata, I’m happy. Ideally the comedy I’d love to do is not just funny but also works on a deeper level as well, but still the funniest thing for me to watch is someone getting hit in the nuts.”

Posted in Story | Comments Off on Comedian Tommy Little tackles being young, stuffing up and getting nude

Review- 21 Jump Street

JumpNot so much a stoner movie, perhaps more the result of film producers getting stoned, and talking about old stuff they can’t get out of their heads. This is the feature-length revival of 21 Jump Street, the late-80s TV cop show that featured a heart-stoppingly beautiful Johnny Depp in his breakout role. It had the unimprovable premise of cops chosen for their youthful looks to go undercover and crack down on youth crime. This now becomes a defiantly immature action-comedy starring Channing Tatum and a slimline Jonah Hill as Jenko and Schmidt, two appalling police officers who must get down with the kids.

Worst enemies in school, they are now cop partners faced with the humiliation of going back to high school as faux-teens to bust a drug ring. It’s not too much of a stretch. Being adult is the real imposture. But it is here that the former jock and nerd find that in this environmentally sensitive Obama age, their school status levels have become very different. Jenko bitterly blames it all on Glee.

It’s a funny twist on teen movies and buddy comedies, creating a postmodern Police Academy, and there’s a gloriously pointless freeway chase that reaches further back to the world of Smokey and the Bandit. Maybe the Brit patriot in me also detects the influence of Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost – but imagining Frost losing as much weight as Hill is too scary.

In its outrageous way, 21 Jump Street has real laughs. Jenko has to move in with Schmidt at his mum and dad’s and experience the full horror of the kiddie photos on the wall. (“It’s like I’ve been murdered and this is a shrine to me,” Schmidt whines.)

In high school, they realise that all the macho values that once held sway are obsolete, and to Jenko’s considerable chagrin, it is shy, plump Schmidt who is now Mr Popular. Being adolescent is more a question of style than either anticipated; it’s all about maintaining a front. As our two heroes are told by their captain: “Teenage the fuck up!” Perhaps that last word should be “down”. But it’s funny.

Posted in Story | Comments Off on Review- 21 Jump Street

Electrical fire disrupts Carlisle Street businesses

POWER has been restored to Carlisle Street after an electrical fire on a power line stopped traffic and business operations.

The Metropolitan Fire and Emergency Services Board was called to the scene at 159 Carlisle Street at 8.06am today following an electrical fire involving high-voltage cables.

MFB officers were unable to pinpoint the cause of the blaze, saying it likely occurred due to a power overload or overheating.

Watch video of the fire here.

Dozens of shops near the incident lost their electricity supply, and some traders lost thousands of dollars in food stock, income and staffing costs.

Carlisle Street was cordoned off, and trams were stopped from entering the section of street affected.

MFB spokeswoman Meg Rayner said two pumpers from Windsor fire station attended, but were unable to put water on the blaze as it was an electrical fault.

She said once power company United Energy arrived and shut off the power, fire crews put the blaze out.

United Energy spokesman Stuart Allott said the company was replacing damaged cabling.

“Because we want to get the job done as safely and quickly and possibly, it will mean traffic stoppages. The work should be done by the end of today,” he said.

Mr Allott said United Energy was investigating the cause.

A bin fire below the affected pole was quickly controlled, and no shops were damaged. Fire crews left the scene at 9.25am.

Cafe Las Chicas, located nearby at 203 Carlisle Street, closed for the day and sent its 10 staff members home.

“We’ll have to throw out some stock, plus the cool rooms and fridges aren’t working,” owner James Olliver said.

“We’re throwing out a lot of the food, we can’t clean any dishes, there’s no hot water.”

Posted in Story | Comments Off on Electrical fire disrupts Carlisle Street businesses

Albert Park MP Calls for compulsory jet-ski Insurance

jet-skiJET-SKIERS should be forced to have third-party insurance, operate further from swimmers and face tougher licence tests and fines, a state MP has urged.

Martin Foley, whose Albert Park electorate takes in beaches including St Kilda and Port Melbourne, has written to Police Minister Peter Ryan calling for tougher regulations for jet-skiers following the death of a swimmer struck by a jet-ski off Port Melbourne almost a fortnight ago.

Mr Foley told The Age the massive growth in jet-ski users was not matched by adequate regulation.

”Week after week over summer the rules are not being applied … jet-skis are going into swimming areas – it’s a recipe for trouble,” he said.

He said there had to be an urgent boost in resourcing to allow water police to better enforce existing laws that prohibited the use of jet-skis in swimming-only zones.

Mr Foley has released an issues paper, Safer Beaches and Waterways: Clamping Down on Jet Skis, and said increased policing of jet-skis should be made an operational priority.

”Agencies quietly concede the issue is not resourced as a priority. It needs to be treated as a priority,” he said in the paper.

”Jet-skis are increasingly powerful and popular vessels that in the wrong hands are dangerous and now shown to be potentially fatal.”

The owner of City Jet Ski, Sandy Ellul, said he supported compulsory insurance and said tougher controls may be warranted.

”I would say that 95 per cent of sales here would take out our insurance policy, and part of that is a public liability policy. I explain to them there is no TAC out on the water, and you need to be protected in case you hurt someone else,” he said. ”If it’s compulsory then they have got not choice.”

Mr Ellul said most people acted appropriately on personal water craft, but a minority were causing problems.

”The majority of customers here at City Jet Ski are families, it’s mum and dad and the two teenage kids, and they are not the people who are doing this, it’s the hoon element,” he said.

”They could make it a kilometre exclusion zone and you would still get the dickheads out there.”

”I have been at Docklands at the weekend and I have seen guys on skis out there at midnight. I don’t know what you do,” he said.

Mr Ellul said he had a good relationship with the water police and ”over Christmas they spend morning to night booking jet-skis, and they are absolutely sick of it”.

Parks Victoria is rolling out new boating and swimming zones across the bay, with new zones already introduced from Port Melbourne to St Kilda. New zones are also being introduced from Dromana to Blairgowrie, Werribee River to Williamstown and at Phillip Island.

A spokeswoman for Mr Ryan said water police had been targeting jet-skis and there had been a large number of penalty notices issued, primarily for speed.

”Water police actively enforce the hoon legislation, breath-testing and ensuring water-goers have appropriate boating and fishing licences,” she said.

She said the minister would give Mr Foley’s letter due consideration.

Police said investigations were continuing into the fatal incident involving the swimmer at Port Melbourne.

Posted in Story | Comments Off on Albert Park MP Calls for compulsory jet-ski Insurance

Newmarket Hotel fined

ST Kilda’s Newmarket Hotel has been fined nearly $30,000 for illegally installed kitchen exhaust flues and mechanical equipment that was causing noise and odour problems for residents.

Port Phillip council took the hotel to court on February 8 for issues arising from redevelopment works since the business re-opened in December 2010.

The court placed the Newmarket Property Group Pty Ltd on a good behaviour bond for 12 months, and ordered it to donate $12,000 to the Lighthouse Foundation charity and pay the council’s costs of $17,700.

Posted in Story | Comments Off on Newmarket Hotel fined